Sex Chickens for a Living and Other Fowl Things I Never Wanted to Know

When the boy band, Color Me Badd, sang "I Wanna Sex You Up", I have a strong feeling that the boys weren't singing about sexing chickens. In the poultry industry, sexing chickens is a not only a common occurance, it is a necessity to the business.

Simply defined, a chicken sexer is someone who identifies the sex of hatchling chicks. Yes, there is an actual job where you decide if a chicken is a boy (rooster) or a girl (hen). Now, why would someone need to do this?

The poultry industry has different feeding programs that suit the different needs for chickens. In the egg business, roosters (males) are not wanted and are typically culled (killed) to lower feeding costs. In the meat industry, the separation of male and female chicks is needed based on the need of the company. A chicken sexer will distinguish the boys from the girls and make sure the hatchling chicks are sent to the proper nourishment program that feeds their destiny.

However, the gender of a chicken cannot be visually identified until a chick is about 4-6 weeks old. This leads us to the next obvious question -

"How exactly does one sex a chicken?"

One can not identify a newly-hatched chicken by simply looking at them. However, some poultry companies breed their chickens in such a hi-tech manner that there are visual differences to the chicks that can be identified easily. These differences are usually in the feathers on the newly-hatched chicks making gender identification much easier and less messy.

Not all poultry companies make it this "easy" on the chicken sexer. On the farms where chickens are not specially bred for easy identification, chicken sexers must actually pick up each individual chick, turn it to the "business end", and manually squeeze some chicken poop out of the chick. Since the sex organs of a chicken are located inside the chicken, this "poop squeeze" will expose a little "bump" if the chick is a male. Female chicks may also have a "bump", but their "bump" is never as large as a males. This process, that I so-eloquently referred to as a "poop squeeze", is actually called "vent sexing" in the poultry industry. Vent Sexing is not just a job, it is an actual skill that chicken sexers spend years learning to master.

I have a bit of experience in the poultry industry (no, not as a chicken sexer). My children's grandparents used to raise broiler chickens here in Georgia. Broiler chicken growers will receive a shipment of 20,000 or so newly-hatched chicks per house and raise them for 6-8 weeks. At this point, the chickens will be picked up and taken to the processing plant where they will inevitably end up at your local grocery store or in your next bucket of extra crispy.

Ever wonder how you "pick up" 20,000 chickens? Enter the job of the "Chicken Catcher".

Here's a "fun fact" about chickens. If you turn the lights out on chickens, they will lie down and be quiet. The brighter the light, the more active the chickens are. Chickens eat and drink when the lights are on, and sleep and get fat in the dark. The proper lighting of a broiler chicken house is a fine science, and being that broiler growers are paid for the biggest chickens grown off the least amount of feed, lighting is crucial to successful "feed conversion".

That said, let's return to the subject of picking up 20,000 chickens to take them to the processing plant. Chicken Catchers are just that - they catch chickens. No, they don't run around after them, either. Chicken Catchers will go into a broiler house and make it pitch black causing the chickens to lie down and be still. Using flashlights, the chicken catchers will direct a small group of chickens in to one bunch, scoop them up, and throw them in cages. The cages are taken out to a truck on the outside and when the truck is full, it's off to the processing plant. Chicken Catchers are fast and can be done collecting 40,000 or so chickens in just a few hours. Keep in mind, a chicken of this age will weigh around 4 pounds, so physical strength is needed if you aspire to become a chicken catcher.

Ever heard the term "pecking order"? Chickens base their rank within their flock by pecking each other. This pecking can be violent and also can be cannibalistic in nature. Chicken growers that only have their chickens for a short time (6-8 weeks), don't tend to notice this behavior in their chickens. Other growers, such as those with hen houses, have their chickens for a much longer amount of time and do have to deal with this aggressive adult behavior. Enter the job of the Chicken De-Beaker. Yes, there is actually a job that requires one to trim the beaks of chickens.

My exposure to the poultry business has been filed in my mental notes under the category of "Things I Never Wanted to Know". I was content to retain my childish belief that chicken came from the Styrofoam plate it was purchased on. Previous to this time in my life, I don't believe I've ever used the words "chicken" and "sex" in that same sentence, let alone the same conversation!

Well, wait... that reminds me of a joke...